We have all wondered if some of the questionable employment-related numbers put out in recent years would evaporate with a new administration. The Job Openings and Labor Turnover report issued today and the employment situation report to be issued Friday will give us our first sense of whether anything will be different. It is unlikely that the staff putting together these numbers has changed at this point, and the JOLT report reflects the December time period, before Trump II arrived. A reminder that the response rate to this survey is around 34%, so the best thing the new leaders could do is figure out how to dramatically improve that so that the output is more credible and trustworthy.
After some month’s where we saw a big surge in openings, this month’s report saw a big downshift, over 500,000 fewer job openings than the prior month. The surge was largely due to professional and business services and this month’s decline is as well. The number of hires showed a modest increase why the number of quits and terminations were largely unchanged. (JOLTS Release)
